Victoria Falls Journal; The Best of Times, and the Worst, for Two Tourist Towns

By MICHAEL WINES

Published: June 21, 2004

VICTORIA FALLS, Zimbabwe—
With a name like that, one would think this town would have no trouble attracting tourists.

After all, Victoria Falls, the town, is cheek-by-jowl with Victoria Falls, the waterfall -- a jaw-dropping, heart-stopping torrent one mile wide and 300 feet high, its constant roar audible for a mile or more, its towering cloud of spray visible from the farthest horizon. Mere words do not do justice to Victoria Falls. One must see it to appreciate it.

Where better to start to see the waterfall than Victoria Falls, the town?

Until lately, the answer was ''nowhere.'' In the contest for falls-hungry tourists, Victoria Falls towered over its only rival, Livingstone, just across the broad Zambezi River in Zambia. Lively Vic Falls embraced everyone from backpackers to jet-setters; bungee-jumpers to golfers. Livingstone, disheveled and sedentary, had some historic cachet: it is named after the explorer David Livingstone, the first European to see the falls. But for tourists, it was an afterthought.

Victoria Falls is not. ''There's just no one coming here,'' a disconsolate businessman said, a conclusion borne out by even a brief stroll in the deserted shopping district.

Since early 2000, when squatters began occupying that nation's white-owned farms in what would become a wholesale seizure of commercial farmland, tourism in Zimbabwe has hit the skids. Things grew worse in 2002, after President Robert G. Mugabe was re-elected in balloting marred by widespread violence. It deepened further last year, as inflation roared past 600 percent and fuel shortages became pervasive.

In truth, Zimbabwe's violence and repression have largely passed by Victoria Falls. The region is so solidly in the camp of Mr. Mugabe's political opponents -- and such an important source of scarce hard currency -- that the government has avoided measures seen in other opposition centers, like the invasions of pro-government youth militia, which might scare tourists away.

But Zimbabwe's reputation has grown increasingly ugly, especially among tourists from members of the Commonwealth nations, mostly former British possessions. Mr. Mugabe quit the Commonwealth in December after it refused to lift its suspension of Zimbabwe in protest of the nation's human rights policies.

One hotelier in Victoria Falls, who refused to be identified for fear of retaliation, said tourist traffic from Europe and the United States has been little affected by Zimbabwe's turmoil, but that visits from commonwealth nations have all but dried up. Some tour agencies in some Commonwealth nations have removed Zimbabwe from their lists, one South African agent said, and replaced it with package trips to Zambia.

During a recent visit to the Zambian side of Victoria Falls, Mike Carter, a New Zealand appraiser on vacation with his family, emerged raincoat-clad from the falls' drenching mist and said, ''We never considered coming to Victoria Falls,'' the town. ''We wouldn't bother going 'til they sort things out.''

Zimbabwe's loss has been Zambia's gain. Livingstone's hotel occupancy has jumped since 2000, to 50 percent from an average of 36 percent, despite a brace of new hotels.

The contrast with Victoria Falls could hardly be more stark. Zimbabwe businessmen say average hotel occupancy runs between 20 and 30 percent, and some of the bigger four-and five-star resorts have severely pared their staff to keep from closing. The world-famous grand dame of local hostelries, the Victoria Falls Hotel, marked its centennial in June with hallways of empty rooms despite an effort to lure celebrants with a 100th-birthday package.

The plight of merchants is, if anything, bleaker. Souvenir shops on the main street to Victoria Falls sometimes pass the entire day without ringing up a single sale, one vendor said. Some wholesalers and street vendors have given up and moved their operations to Zambia, prompting a government minister to denounce them as unpatriotic in a recent meeting with the town's beleaguered businessmen.

Things could change, of course: longtime residents remember that Vic Falls prospered most in the 1970's, when Zambia's economic policies drove that nation and its Livingstone tourism business close to ruin.

In the meantime, merchants and hotel operators might take a tip from a Zimbabwe tourism Web site, www.go2africa.com/zimbabwe, and try to turn their bitter plight into tourism lemonade.

Zimbabwe's national parks ''are completely safe to visit, as they are far from the cities where the instability exists,'' the site says. ''Game lodges are desperate for occupants, so prices are extremely competitive.

''And low lodge occupancy means you'll have thousands of hectares of pristine game country virtually all to yourself.''

Photos: At the Victoria Falls Safari Lodge outside Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe, a smattering of tourists lounged near the peak of the season this month, above. But tourists are flocking to the Zambian side of the falls, below. (Photographs by Michael Wines/The New York Times)